OZARK, Mo. — A British armored car guard suspected of driving off with a fortune worth $1.5 million back in 1993 has been captured in rural Missouri, where he had been working as a cable guy and raising a son who apparently knew nothing of his father’s past.

Edward John Maher, now 56, was dubbed “Fast Eddie” in news reports after the heist in England, but he quickly vanished. After nearly two decades as a fugitive, he was arrested Wednesday in an apartment in the tiny town of Ozark, 160 miles southeast of Kansas City, where he had been living under a brother’s name, Michael Maher.

In his effort to stay hidden, Maher fled from Britain with his family and may have moved several times within the U.S. Property records suggest he lived in at least four states in New England, the South and the upper Midwest.

FBI spokeswoman Bridget Patton said federal officials do not know what happened to the money.

Maher’s guise began unraveling Monday, when Ozark police received a tip that a man going by that name was really a fugitive from Britain. An officer compared his driver’s license photo with a picture from 1993 and contacted the FBI, which also compared the photos and determined they were likely the same man.

On the same day, Maher happened to be bailing his 23-year-old son out of jail in the nearby town of Nixa when a police officer told him authorities suspected Maher was wanted in England, but they could not arrest him. Because there were no U.S. warrants for either Michael or Edward Maher, police had no reason to take him into custody.

They arrested him later, after immigration officials determined he was in the U.S. illegally.

According to an FBI affidavit, Maher’s son overheard what the officer had said and asked his father about it.

The father “was irate,” the affidavit said. “Maher told his son that they would have to leave again and threatened to kill the person who tipped the police off about his identity.”

The son, Lee King, had been jailed on some outstanding warrants that police found after a report of a domestic situation. Officers concluded it was just a verbal argument.

The next day, Maher’s son was being interviewed by an FBI agent when his father called and said they had to leave immediately. The son refused to go. A short time later, Ozark police officers and federal agents saw Maher, a woman and a boy leaving their home carrying clothes. They were later seen checking into a local motel.

The son contacted the FBI agent Wednesday and reported that his father had changed his mind about fleeing. If officers came to his home to arrest him, the son said, the father would not resist. Maher was taken into custody a short time later.

He is accused of driving off in an armored car while a fellow security guard was making a delivery to a bank in Suffolk, England. The van was later abandoned. Fifty bags containing coins and notes worth 1 million pounds, or $1.5 million, were missing.

Around 5:35 p.m., CHP officers responded to a report of the incident in westbound I-580 lanes at Main Street. En route, officers learned a vehicle's driver said a person in another vehicle brandished a handgun and fired a shot.

In addition to evacuating 10 neighboring homes, deputies restricted pedestrian and vehicle traffic in the area while the sheriff's office bomb squad "safely disposed" of the explosives, officials said.